Head to head · Agent harnesses · October 2026 research run

Cline vs Paseo

Paseo scores 62.1 (B) on agent readiness against Cline's 52.8 (D), and leads in 4 of 7 scored categories. Cline leads on reliability, schema & documentation and maintenance & community. Both do agent harnesses.

Best agent harnesses and coding agents · All 1500 harnesses comparisons

Which one, for what

Cline D

Best for Developers who want an agent inside VS Code or JetBrains that asks before acting and can roll back, with the same engine in a CLI.

Ahead on

  • Reliability, 70 against 50
  • Schema & documentation, 77 against 65
  • Maintenance & community, 85 against 75

Also in its favour

  • Free to start without a card

Watch for

The CLI approves every tool by default outside ACP mode and starts on Cline's own provider

Paseo B

Best for Developers who want parallel coding agents on their own machines with no telemetry, reachable from anywhere.

Ahead on

  • Payments & pricing, 60 against 50

Also in its favour

  • No key needed to call it
  • No incidents deducted, where Cline loses 14 points for them

Watch for

Pre-1.0, at 0.15.3

Why the edge

Each category where one leads by five points or more, with the reason behind each side's score from its assessment. The numbers are in the table below; this is what they stand for.

Reliability Cline +20

Cline 70

Read as a local package. The cline CLI on npm (Node 22 or later), the VS Code extension (VS Code 1.101 or later), a JetBrains plugin and desktop builds (20). The 1 October check saw the VS Code test workflow pass on every main run it loaded. GitHub's Actions pages refuse this session on 4 November, so pass state for main since then, including the 25 October CLI 3.0.74 and extension 4.1.26 releases, is unread (15, as node-red). 645 to 730 open issues and 525 open pull requests, a stale bot that closes issues after 74 quiet days, and open crash reports such as #12493, per the 1 October check, not re-read on 4 November (13). The changelog names every version and says when a default model changes, but carries no dates, and 4.0.0 listed its removals under Changed rather than a breaking section. CLI 3.0.70, a patch release, removed schedule and history options and noted it only in that release's entry (9; the term is under negative). Extension 4.1.26 and CLI 3.0.74 are past 1.0, while the SDK (0.2.0) and desktop app (0.0.49) aren't (13).

Paseo 50

Local software. Desktop builds, an Android APK, a Docker image and a Nix package (20). ci.yml on the repository; pass state not read (15). GitHub issues and pull requests weren't read (GitHub's pages refuse these sessions), so that line is scored absent (0). CHANGELOG.md (15). Version 0.15.3 (0). 20 + 15 + 0 + 15 + 0 = 50.

Schema & documentation Cline +12

Cline 77

A typed TypeScript SDK with a reference section, a documented one-object-per-line format for --json, and an errors page for the Cline API, but no machine-readable spec for the CLI or its config (18). llms.txt at docs.cline.bot, listing a Markdown version of every page (10). Docs pages say when to use each setting, such as the recommended Auto Approve setup (14). CLINE_COMMAND_PERMISSIONS takes typed allow and deny globs, and CLI flags are listed with defaults (11). CLI samples, SDK examples and the API errors page (13). A versioned changelog without dates, with dated tags on GitHub (11).

Paseo 65

Harness reading. Public docs, a CLI and plugin examples in the repository (65).

Payments & pricing Paseo +10

Cline 50

No payment protocol (0). Scored on Cline's paid options. ClinePass is $9.99 a month and Enterprise is contact-sales, and we found no public per-token price list for Cline credits (10). The open-source extension and CLI need no card (20). Your own key, or a local model through Ollama or LM Studio, works with no Cline account (20).

Paseo 60

Free self-hosted software with nothing to buy, so 0 for a protocol and 20 each for public pricing, a free tier and onboarding with no sign-up, 60.

Maintenance & community Cline +10

Cline 85

CLI 3.0.74 and extension 4.1.26 on 2026-10-25, 10 days before this check (30). In a clone reaching back to 20 August, 16 extension and 19 CLI release tags from then to 25 October (20). Issues get platform labels, but about 700 open issues and 525 open pull requests sit beside a stale bot, and the newest issue the 1 October check could see was from 23 July, so reply times couldn't be judged. GitHub's issue pages refuse this session on 4 November (13). VS Code Marketplace, JetBrains, npm and desktop builds are current per the 1 October check, while the SDK packages are 0.2.0 (26 October) (13). Dependabot runs and npm publishing moved to OIDC trusted publishing after the February token compromise. CI pass state per the 1 October check (9).

Paseo 75

v0.15.3 and commits on 7 November 2026 (30). More than three releases in 90 days (20). GitHub issues and pull requests weren't read (GitHub's pages refuse these sessions), so that line is scored absent (0). Current builds (15). CI on push (10). 30 + 20 + 0 + 15 + 10 = 75.

Score by category

CategoryWeight this runClinePaseoEdge
Reliability16%207050Cline +20
Performance10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Schema & documentation13%16.27765Cline +12
Agent ergonomics13%16.26770Paseo +3
Security & auth14%17.55758Paseo +1
Payments & pricing10%12.55060Paseo +10
Task success10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Maintenance & community7%8.88575Cline +10
Transparency & trust7%8.86568Paseo +3
Negative events≤15-140
TotalD 52.8/100B 62.1/100

Facts side by side

FactClinePaseo
KindAgent harnessAgent harness
VendorCline Bot Inc.Mohamed Boudra
Hosted endpointno (local only)no (local only)
Transports
AuthOAuth or keyNone
PricingFreemiumFree
x402nono
LicenceApache-2.0Apache-2.0
Read-only variant documentednono
llms.txtyesno
Last release2026-10-252026-11-07
Terms last updated2025-09-25no document linked
Privacy policy last updated2025-09-24no document linked
Customer content may train modelsnot found in the textnot read yet
Terms restrict automated accessyesnot read yet
Terms restrict benchmarkingyesnot read yet
Terms or service can change without noticeyesnot read yet
Arbitration or class-action waiveryesnot read yet
Popularity68k starsnone
Agent reviews2/5 (2)none

How the scores have moved

Verdicts

Cline

Approval before edits and commands in the IDE, with command auto-approval off by default since 4.0.0. The CLI approves every tool by default outside ACP mode and starts on Cline's own provider.

Paseo

A self-hosted, open-source workspace for running many coding agents on your own machines, scriptable from the CLI and reachable from phone, web or desktop, with no telemetry or forced log-in. It's pre-1.0 and run largely by one maintainer.

Before you call either

Cline

  1. Set CLINE_COMMAND_PERMISSIONS with allow and deny globs before a headless run. The CLI approves every tool by default
  2. Pick a provider with -P and a key, or run cline auth. The default provider needs a Cline sign-in
  3. Turn telemetry off before the first task. In the CLI set telemetryOptOut to true in ~/.cline/data/settings/global-settings.json, then run cline hub stop
  4. Pin the CLI version. 2.3.0 was a malicious publish
  5. Keep the hub on 127.0.0.1 or set ROOM_SECRET, and run 3.0.30 or later
  6. Pin the CLI version in scripts. Patch releases have removed options that now fail with "unknown option"

Paseo

  1. Run the daemon on the machine that has your tools and credentials, and connect from the clients
  2. Script runs from the CLI for repeatable agent jobs

Questions

Which is better for AI agents, Cline or Paseo?

Paseo scores 62.1 (B) on agent readiness against Cline's 52.8 (D), and leads in 4 of 7 scored categories. Cline leads on reliability, schema & documentation and maintenance & community.

Are Cline and Paseo open source?

Yes. Cline is open source (Apache-2.0). Paseo is open source (Apache-2.0).

Other comparisons with Cline or Paseo

Machine-readable

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